With all of the going ons in my life, one thing that has been put on the back burner has been my oft-discussed move to the new iMac computers. As a priority in my life, it has been downgraded quite a bit. But like many other things in life, sometimes waiting for something may prove more advantageous than rushing in.

This week the iMac received a bit of an upgrade with faster CPUs and more default RAM for the same price pints as before. Apple also released a new top-end version of the iMac, a 24″ monitor version with a 3.06 GHz CPU and a NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS graphics card making it more a gamer’s machine than anything else.

Considering that the desktop line received a major overhaul last summer, it is premature to expect any significant upgrades for the iMac. This year, it is the MacBooks that will get the overhauls as we have seen first with the Air version.

The Leopard version of the Mac OS will be getting a new update in the very near future and may get another one yet by the time I get to buying the iMac. So far I am still comfortable with my decision to switch but holding back for a bit looks like a prudent decision if not a totally voluntary one.

The new 20-inch 2.66 GHz iMac, for a suggested retail price of $1,499 (US), includes:

• 20-inch widescreen LCD display
• 2.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with a 1066 MHz front-side bus
• 2GB of 800 MHz DDR2 SDRAM expandable to 4GB
• 320GB Serial ATA hard drive running at 7200 rpm
• a slot-load 8x SuperDrive with double-layer support (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
• ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO with 256MB GDDR3 memory
• built-in iSight video camera
• built-in AirPort Extreme 802.11n wireless networking & Bluetooth 2.1+EDR
• mini-DVI out (adapters for DVI, VGA and Composite/S-Video sold separately)
• built-in stereo speakers and microphone; and
• the Apple Keyboard, Mighty Mouse and infrared Apple Remote.